Pulitzer Prize Winner to Speak at 2010 Albaugh Lecture

Richard Wilbur, U.S. Poet Laureate and Pulitzer-prize winner, will give this year's Albaugh Lecture, "An Evening with Richard Wilbur," at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 16, in the Barfield Drawing Room in the Bill Daniel Student Center on the Baylor campus.

"The purpose of the Albaugh Lecture is to bring a nationally renowned scholar, artist, or thinker to the Baylor campus for the benefit of the university community as well as the Waco community," said Dr. Michael Foley, associate professor of patristics at Baylor. "Our goal is to sponsor a speaker who epitomizes the kind of excellence regarding the life of the mind that characterizes both Phi Beta Kappa and Baylor University. We look for a person who is not just knowledgeable but somehow wise."

Wilbur composed several volumes of poetry, won the Pulitzer prize twice, translated the plays of Molière and Racine, wrote several children's books, and worked with Leonard Bernstein to create the lyrics for the musical Candide.

He graduated from Amherst College in 1942 and served in the United States Army during World War II. After the Army and graduate school at Harvard University, Wilbur taught at Wesleyan University and Smith College. He was awarded the 1983 Drama Desk Special Award for his translation of The Misanthrope, the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the National Book Award, the Edna St Vincent Millay award, the Bollingen Prize, and the Chevalier, Ordre National des Palmes Academiques.

The Roy B. Albaugh lectureship was endowed in the late 1970s by Oma Buchanan Albaugh in memory of her late husband, a Waco business and civic leader. Past lecturers include Leon Kass, Ralph Nader, Stephen J. Gould and John Updike.